One of the most neglected aspects of running a business is the health and safety of its employees. And all too often, it isn't until a tragic event takes place that health and safety training is taken seriously. Tyler Foley, actor, author and managing director of Total Buy-In — a safety consulting firm in Calgary — knows this all too well. He stopped by the Leading With Nice Interview Series podcast to talk about why investing in proper health and safety training at your workplace might be the most profitable thing you can do for your business.
One of the most neglected aspects of running a business is the health and safety of its employees. And all too often, it isn't until a tragic event takes place that health and safety training is taken seriously. Tyler Foley, actor, author and managing director of Total Buy-In — a safety consulting firm in Calgary — knows this all too well. He stopped by the Leading With Nice Interview Series podcast to talk about why investing in proper health and safety training at your workplace might be the most profitable thing you can do for your business.
[00:00:00.310] - Speaker 1
Why are you in business, period? I don't care about safety at this point. I just want to know, why are you in business? Are you excited every day to get up and do the thing that you're doing? Because if you come to work going, well, guess what your employees are very, very likely doing when they get to work. And if that is their attitude coming into work to actually perform the job that they're going to do, they are very likely not doing that job in a safe manner because there's no drive or desire to do anything other than just putting my time no to the grindstone.
[00:00:32.820] - Speaker 1
Get out of here.
[00:00:44.610] - Speaker 2
Hey, good day. And welcome to the Leading With Nice Interview Series podcast. We want to help you inspire others, build loyalty and get results. Now, today, I'm super excited to have our guest, Tyler Foley on, and the reason why — I'm going to leave the topic (it'll unearth itself later on). Oftentimes when we get feedback from this show, some of the feedback we get is we really appreciate the "why stories." And I think what makes what Tyler does so powerful is his why behind it. So we'll dive into that a little bit.
[00:01:18.820] - Speaker 2
But if you're a fan of that sort of thing, you're going to really enjoy this conversation. So without further ado, Tyler, welcome to the show. And thanks for joining us today.
[00:01:29.220] - Speaker 1
Oh, it's my pleasure, Mathieu. I've been looking forward to this. Leading With Nice: I mean, how can you not get excited for a show with a title like that?
[00:01:37.100] - Speaker 2
Well, it's funny, actually, when I was thinking about naming the company one of my mentors or somebody I really respect who typically I would have thought they were a real shark in business, and the idea of nice would not have been appealing to them at all. They're actually the one that encouraged me the most to name my company because the values that we build our company on, I call the Nice Values. But, nonetheless, thank you very much. But some people are not into it. They definitely.
[00:02:05.300] - Speaker 2
And that's good to know, because I know we're not a good fit for each other.
[00:02:09.030] - Speaker 1
That is everything. It's one of the first tenants that I preach whenever I'm doing the consulting that I do.
[00:02:15.930] - Speaker 2
Can you just really quickly? Your consulting is called Total Buy- In. Can you just really briefly before we get into the conversation what it is you do who typically you work with and what your clients are hoping to achieve.
[00:02:32.120] - Speaker 1
Total Buy-In is a safety consulting firm. We specialize in auditing health and safety management systems, as well as putting together specialized and specific training when it comes to health and safety to help promote safety in the workplace. And it Calce about really circuitously. Actually, I stumbled into safety from a fine arts performing background of all things. So, yeah, Total Buy-In. The idea is to coach companies to buy in and receive total buy-in from all levels of the organization, from the senior executives down to your workers on the floor, from visitors to contractors.
[00:03:21.110] - Speaker 1
All members of an organization should be bought into the culture that you are trying to put together. And I spend a lot of time with my clients, getting them to understand that there is no division between your corporate culture and your safety culture. You have a culture within your organization. And if you want better safety, you need to start looking at the corporate culture as a whole.
[00:03:45.340] - Speaker 2
You know, when Naomi and I, who works with me here Leading With Nice, were reading that on a website somewhere. Maybe we heard another podcast. We turned each other and laughed because we were once asked to do a business ethics workshop. We're like, there's not really business ethics and home ethics. It's like ethics, and that was a huge red flag to us that they thought there could be business ethics as opposed to, like, regular ethics anyhow. So I love that your take on that is like, yeah, it's a culture period, regardless of what word you put in front of it.
[00:04:17.830] - Speaker 2
So I know that some tragedy in your life really inspired you to start Total Buy-In. Can you share a bit about that story? Because I think there's real power in understanding this?
[00:04:28.450] - Speaker 1
No, absolutely. When I was six years old, my father was a teacher and had taken a sabbatical from teaching for a year to pursue his dream and his passion. He always wanted to be a restauranteur. And my uncle had recently moved from Winnipeg back to our hometown. And so him and my uncle decided that they were going to open up a restaurant in downtown Calgary. And at the time we were living in a rural community that was easily an hour to an hour and ten minute drive from downtown.
[00:05:04.950] - Speaker 1
And my father was a hard, hard worker, came from the East Coast, knew how to put in some sweat equity. And subsequently, he was doing 16 to 18 hours days, setting up the restaurant starting November 1 or rather, February 1 and then February 10, 1986, after a very long day, he was driving home, fell asleep at the wheel and had a single motor vehicle incident where he impacted an abandoned concrete bunker from World War II. My hometown used to be where they stationed most of the Pacific air runs for the Pacific War, and he smacked into what was an old munitions bunker and died instantly.
[00:05:59.550] - Speaker 1
And I will never forget for the life of me the sound that my mother made when our local physician and an RCMP officer were at the door and told her that she was never going to see her husband again. It was the most spine chilling animal sound that I've ever heard. It gutted me, and I never want to hear it again. And that was an early lesson that things happened in a blink of an eye they're never planned, and that there are, in fact, ways to avoid that.
[00:06:39.070] - Speaker 1
My father, if he'd had some kind of fatigue management or just even had been traveling with somebody else, like my uncle and him were both commuting back to the same town. So why were they having to drive separately, or why did they have to work so late? There were things that could have been done to avoid it. And I have dedicated Total Buy-In to the pursuit of ensuring that no one ever has to hear that their spouse can't make it home.
[00:07:06.810] - Speaker 2
Thank you so much. I know you've told this story as you talk about your company a lot, but I can't imagine it's ever easy, so thank you so much for just being so candid and authentic. Thank you so much for that. That's really powerful.
[00:07:19.490] - Speaker 1
Well, and I think a lot of what I do is encourage executives and upper management to be authentic with why safety is important to them, because there isn't a single executive out there who's like, yeah, no, it's okay. If one of my workers dies, right? At least I would hope not. Because then we talk about business ethics at that point, business ethics. And I think we are all caring people. And when you can say why something is important to you, what your value structure is and communicate that out to your employees, that's usually when you have the most change, that's when you get the buy in.
[00:07:56.370] - Speaker 1
And so most of my journey is encouraging people to be vulnerable and express why these things are important to them and really drive down.
[00:08:07.250] - Speaker 2
So the other thing that really kind of, like, caught my eye when I came across you and your work was you hear a lot about mental health, safety training and mental health first aid. And so when you came across, I was like, oh, wait. This guy is actually talking about, like, physical, real danger, which I don't want to suggest that mental health is not extremely important. But physical danger really exists as well in the workplace. And so I was curious. I'm like, why do we need people to consult on this?
[00:08:38.600] - Speaker 2
Because you can see big, dangerous machines. You're probably a bit younger than me. But I remember that commercial growing up with that robot, the robot.
[00:08:45.540] - Speaker 1
I can know exactly what you're talking about. I am Luca. I can put my hand back on if you can.
[00:08:50.270] - Speaker 2
Oh, my gosh. That's a touchdown. Somebody else knows that robot. He knows that this is the best podcast ever. I hate to make life. What is the roadblock? What is a big obstacle between businesses ensuring employees safety? I'm just not saying full stop. This is not safe. We're going to do something about it. What is the roadblock?
[00:09:16.830] - Speaker 1
Typically, it's our own ignorance and arrogance based on so many factors, we have an assumed risk tolerance, and you and I have it in everyday life if I'm going to go drive my truck and my mailbox coming into my cul de sac, so it's a closed circuit is probably 300 yards from my front door and on the opposite side of the road, and I habitually will drive in and park facing the wrong way down the road to hop out and get my mail, because now I can get out of the driver's side and just hop onto the curb.
[00:10:04.970] - Speaker 1
And then I have to have that debate in my head. I'm only driving five houses down. Do I put my seatbelt back on, and we all have a risk tolerance. And for me I will always put it on because my daughter sits directly behind me, and I want her to instill that as a habit. But I'm already doing a bad habit in that I am pulling over to the left side of the road, which is technically not a safe thing to do and leaves a blind spot when I pull out, even though I'm checking my mirrors and I'm shoulder checking before I pull right back into the laneway and I'm in a cul de sac.
[00:10:45.190] - Speaker 1
Technically, what I'm doing is dangerous, and it's right next to an alleyway. So we all have these inherent risk tolerances. Some are more risk adverse and some aren't. The problem is we become more risk tolerant, the more complacent we become with the situation. And so what you and I could do and walk into, say, a large industrial complex and see this big whirring machine that's spinning at thousands of RPMs a second with blades and knives slashing at stuff and going, oh, my goodness, that's so dangerous.
[00:11:21.210] - Speaker 1
You have the operator of that machine being like, Are you kidding? I've been here for 20 years and nothing's ever happened. And it's that nothing's ever happened attitude that creates this assumed risk tolerance and degrades our ability to accurately assess the dangers in the workplace because they become commonplace and therefore become invisible.
[00:11:42.540] - Speaker 2
Okay, so I just thought it says you're speaking right now, business owners, directors. You will make decisions around safety and replace safety or driving along. They're on their run. They're on their walk. They listen to this and they're like, they just had a moment. So what are two or three things they can do tomorrow or later on today at work to kind of take a look and see if they might need to be reconsidering how they're approaching safety? What are some things you hear from clients when they call you?
[00:12:10.170] - Speaker 1
Well, again, we don't understand our biases. I don't know my blind spots because I can't see beyond them. So one of the first things to do is change your viewpoint. One of the questions first things that I always ask of any of the executives. I will get the entire C suite team together. Whoever the main leadership of an organization is, I get them all in a room together. And I say, when was the last time you walked to the floor? When were you in the field? When was the last time you actually got out and talked to somebody about their job and had a one on one conversation.
[00:12:43.750] - Speaker 1
And a lot of times I get, oh, I'm too busy for that. I'm running an Empire with thousands of employees. And then I point out all the number of top 100 top 50 employers in Canada in the world, the people who are constantly getting JD Power and Associates rankings. And I go, they have time. They have time. You have time. You make time for what is important to you. And I'm not saying that you have to do it every day or every hour. But if you can't consciously remember the last time you got out and looked around your organization, that's a problem.
[00:13:21.660] - Speaker 1
If you can't think of the last time you had a conversation with an average employee, a worker in the field, that's a problem, because now you are not visibly leading your organization. Never mind culture, safety, culture. You are not leading your organization if your front line has never seen you. And I think of that TV series, The Undercover Boss, all the insights that they got by going and putting on a disguise and just working in and they were like, I didn't know that this was a thing because they just don't know because that information doesn't necessarily make itself up the chain.
[00:14:04.440] - Speaker 1
It kind of gets diluted until it gets to you and you get the summary report.
[00:14:07.870] - Speaker 2
Right.
[00:14:08.320] - Speaker 1
So changing your perspective is the key right there. And however you choose to do it is up to you.
[00:14:13.800] - Speaker 2
You and I think actually strengthens your point. There is often an undercover boss whether employees come back to meet the boss after they're not in disguise. Most of the time they don't know who it is. They're like, oh, you're the CEO. So I think that just goes to further, like, they're getting all these crazy new insights because they are for the first time. So one thing they can do is get it from behind. What's one more thing they get a practical tip they can do right away, like today after they've heard this podcast.
[00:14:41.410] - Speaker 1
First thing they can do is switch people's roles. So if I have an operator of machine A and then I have an admin person in office B, do you really want to understand where some of the dangers and the hazards are? You have those two workers get together and go to each other's workstation and just take a peek and write down all the things that they don't know, right. I often explain to people that they need to adopt the curiosity of a five year old. My daughter just turned six years old yesterday, and she is constantly questioning the world.
[00:15:22.240] - Speaker 1
Why, Daddy? Why that's all she asks me. She never stops and it's great because it forces me to now literally change my viewpoint. And the other thing is, too. We are so used to walking at our eye level. I'm five foot seven.
[00:15:41.560]
Right.
[00:15:42.690] - Speaker 1
Some of the things that I can't see because of my height because they're too up high where somebody who is 6ft tall goes, oh, no, it's right there. But I also get to see the stuff that's at the lower level that some people who are taller are oblivious to, so literally physically changing your viewpoint. You'd be surprised what it is. I learned this trick from a realtor. I used to buy and sell houses like it was trading cards live in Alberta. You understand? I'm from Alberta. What we do, it's our pastime and our hobby, and my realtor would go in and she would have me lie down on the floor because we all do the same thing.
[00:16:22.750] - Speaker 1
Right? We walk through the door and we look around. That's nice. That's good. But when I lay down on the floor and I start looking at it from a completely, totally warped view of what I would normally do now, all of a sudden, I can see the cracks in the baseboard. I can see where the paint is poor up top. And they didn't do a good line between the roof and the wall. I can see all of these things because I'm not doing that same walkthrough.
[00:16:50.730] - Speaker 1
I've literally physically changed it. So I would have people change departments, and then I would adopt the curiosity of a five year old. And I would also literally physically change my viewpoint. You'd be surprised what happens when you get low and Crouch or when you get on a scissor lift and look around. You'd be surprised.
[00:17:09.270] - Speaker 2
I worked in education for a while, and I worked with a lot of students who are in photography and journalism. And I would say to them like, hey, go show me. Bring me a great photographer. Show me one online, and they show me a photograph. And I would say, okay, before the photographer even snapped the shutter, where were they? And they say, Well, they're in the physical location. No. Is this photograph taken from this person standing up in 910 ten? The great photograph they loved was because the person obviously had the camera close to the ground or they had gotten up on top of a chair even or taking it from a different vantage point.
[00:17:45.020] - Speaker 2
So I think there's a lot of lessons broadly on just changing your perspective. Okay. That was great. I knew people after your first answer, there would be, like, immediately their lights start to go off. So I wanted to give them some actionable items right away.
[00:17:59.390] - Speaker 1
Well, if they need more inspiration, they just need watch Dead Poets Society and the Captain. My captain scene. Yeah, not the end one. The first one that spawns it, right. Because that's what they say. Exactly what Robin Williams character says yes. He tells them to get up on the desk and not just their desk. He had them come up and stand on his yes, right. They all marched through and stood up on his. And that's a completely different view.
[00:18:24.580] - Speaker 2
So I strongly encourage it for my Gen Z listeners. Deadpool Society is a movie with the comedian Robin Williams, you might know as the voice of the Genie in Aladdin. And he played a private school English teacher, and he inspired young kids to be bigger than themselves. You can look that up on the old Wide Web. So you show them that you open their eyes to this. But then there's still sometimes that gap between. Okay, now I understand it, but I'm not excited about it. So how do you go about inspiring them to invest in this employee safety?
[00:18:58.480] - Speaker 2
How do you bridge that gap? Sometimes I'm sure it happens on its own, but when it's not clicking, where do you go?
[00:19:04.350] - Speaker 1
Well. So the first thing is I can't inspire anybody to do anything. And that's the first key is that if it doesn't drive from the internal, it'll never happen. I've got a whole bag of tricks because I've been in person and I treat every company like it's a personal development client, like a private coaching client. I went and got coaching certification to be a better consultant. I don't do that one on one private coaching business coaching. I know a lot of people who do a really good job of it, but I wanted to use those principles because I think that every company reflects its own values and its own value system.
[00:19:44.930] - Speaker 1
And the first question I have is, Why are you doing the business? Some people are driven by money, some people are driven by Fame, some people are driven by importance. Some people are driven by charity and want to give. I don't care what the driving factor is, because I'm not going to change that. But you need to align with why you're doing the thing. If you don't even know that, first of all, you probably have other struggles within your business. Safety is not the only issue you're having.
[00:20:14.310] - Speaker 1
So I want to go in and I want to look at what the culture is and look at what the expectation of what the culture is, because no two companies are going to be the same, and yet they could both operate very safely or very dangerously. I can have two companies doing the exact same thing with the exact same value set and almost the exact same mission statement. And one company Yuill have WCB premiums that are half of the industry rate, and one will have WCB premiums that are double the average industry rate.
[00:20:44.300] - Speaker 1
And it has everything to do with how the culture is communicated and not what the culture is. And so ultimately, it comes down to leadership. And if leadership doesn't know what their driving factor is, that's the first thing I have to look at. Why are you in business, period? I don't care about safety at this point. I just want to know, why are you in business? Are you excited every day to get up and do the thing that you're doing? Because if you're not and then we have to look at that, too, because if you come to work going, oh, God.
[00:21:13.180] - Speaker 1
Just another. Why am I even doing this? Well, guess what your employees are very likely doing when they get to work. And if that is their attitude coming into work to actually perform the job that they're going to do, they are very likely not doing that job in a safe manner, not because they don't want to be and not because you don't want them to be. But because there's no drive or desire to do anything other than just putting my Tim NASA to the grinds. Don't get out of here.
[00:21:41.310] - Speaker 1
And so we have to address that. And the really good leaders understand that good leaders are going to lead. And so all they have to do is step in front and say again, go back to this is important to me because of this and be a little bit more vulnerable with sharing why they're doing those things. And then all of a sudden, people go, oh, now I understand, my boss, that's usually half the half the battle I don't get why we were doing this. Well, now let's give you context and you can move forward through it.
[00:22:09.680] - Speaker 2
So what are some of the outcomes then? Like when the C suite has bought in? They're like, yeah, this is really important. They really start changing or making efforts to bring about a safety culture or culture that includes safety. Rather, how do you see employees change? What are some of the benefits help the people that are leaders that are listening to this right now understand what they're going to get out of this, what's their ROI going to be?
[00:22:32.110] - Speaker 1
Well, the biggest problem with safety is that the ROI is usually intangible. There are very few things that can be tracked on a ledger where I can say there are some things. So if you have good employee engagement and you have fewer incidents, you are going to have fewer reported injuries, which will reduce your insurance premiums. And so that's a thing that you can actually check off on a box and say, okay, well, we have reduced premiums. We have reduced, Brandon, because we have a preventive maintenance program in place.
[00:23:07.140] - Speaker 1
So we're maintaining our equipment longer. So we're stretching out the use of it. So our capital investment dollars are lower. Those are all ledger things that you can actually track. And for my finance base, the people who are really into it and the money, I will track them through some of that stuff if they've developed a health and safety management system that's auditable oftentimes your government entities will give you a further discount on your WCB premium. And so there's some incentives to do that. But none of that translates the same way that having a good culture of people who trust each other and want to work for you and not go somewhere else has.
[00:23:45.520] - Speaker 1
Those are the intangibles that are really hard to put dollar figures on, but translate through good companies that see sustained profits. Simon Sinek said it better than anyone else that I've ever heard. He said. A team is not a group of people who work together. A team is a group of people who trust each other. And that, to me, is important because one of the things that I will often say to my clients is compliance is not compassion. You can be compliant with legislation. You can have everything in place, but if you have no compassion for your people, there's no point in them following that compliance.
[00:24:22.110] - Speaker 1
You have to care and they have to care. They have to not only have compassion, but they also have to have passion. The two passion and compassion need to go together within your company. I need to be excited to come and work for you. If I can't be animated like this and go, I work for the greatest employer. That's some of your first steps because you are probably bleeding trade secrets. You're probably bleeding talent. You're not retaining talent. I saw a really great infographic the other day on LinkedIn.
[00:24:54.790] - Speaker 1
I don't know where it came from. I wish I could credit it to somebody who's developed that infographic, but they put nine elements together of why employees stay. The first one was that employees are paid well, right. You pay your staff, they're going to stay. They're also mentored. If they have a path to growth, they're going to stay because they want to continue because you've given them. You've said if you do these these things, you're going to be here. And then guess what. If you are promoted, which is one of the fourth elements you are going to then be paid more well paid.
[00:25:27.070] - Speaker 1
It all becomes cyclical, and mentorship comes with being challenged. If I challenge you, if you have a need to want to do a thing or you have a problem to solve, the human brain just wants to solve that problem, and so you're going to stick until the problem is solved. So they need to be challenged. They need to be involved in the program so that they understand that they need to feel that they are needed within. They can't just be a cog in the wheel, a number in a system that just turns a Bolt and walks away.
[00:25:56.230] - Speaker 1
They need to know what their involvement is and feel that their contribution matters, and subsequently they need to be appreciated. When they're doing a good job, they need to be rewarded. That allows them to feel trusted, which again keeps retention. And that gives them a feeling of empowerment, which gives them trusted and they feel valued. All those nine things are important in employee retention, and you'll notice that five of them tied directly into safety and have zero dollar cost up front on it. I can mentor you without having it cost me more.
[00:26:26.990] - Speaker 1
I can keep you challenged without it costing more. I can empower you. I can get you involved. I can give you acknowledgement of appreciation. All of those things don't cost but are so critical in putting together a health and safety management system that is followed by people. And it starts with leadership at the top, because if a leader can't say what they're going to do to pay and reward their employees, what kind of mentorship place they have a structure in place to guide employees to a higher level, what kind of challenges they're going to pass on to their employees, to push them to be better so that the company can then be pushed to be better.
[00:27:03.070] - Speaker 1
All of those things matter, and it comes from the leadership. So back to Simon Sinneck's, quote, A team is not a group of people working together. A team is a group of people who trust each other and without trust, you won't have safety. And if you have a lot of incidents, you're probably going to find that you have fewer clients who want to work with you because you have a bad reputation. And again, that's one of those things that you can't put on a ledger. You can't calculate the work that you didn't get, right?
[00:27:29.330] - Speaker 2
Yes.
[00:27:29.890] - Speaker 1
And yet the work that you didn't get is probably very vastly impacted by a lack of safety or a lack of culture because of a reputation.
[00:27:38.620] - Speaker 2
I was thinking when I was asking the question, I was like, well, less critically injured employees would be one good measurement. I was thinking about like, oh, am I just asking him to like, how do we build a sign that says, how many days since the last accident?
[00:27:52.730] - Speaker 1
And I hate those, by the way. Yeah, of course, because that's a fast way to promote the wrong thing. That's the other thing when you're building a culture, what are you trying to promote? One of the big dangers of so many times since lost time incident is that there becomes this culture of hiding them so that we can keep that number maintained, right? I would rather see number of days of consistent reporting or number of days of inspections being completed on time. All of those things are leading indicators, the things that happened prior to an incident, all of our legging indicators past incident.
[00:28:28.390] - Speaker 1
Yes. You want to see those trend down, but you want to know why they're trending down. And the best way to do that is to not make them the focus and make the leading indicators the focus. And that's what you promote. How many safety meetings have we conducted this year? This month? This week, what is our average attendance at them? And can we push it to 100% or get close so that people actually want to attend? How do we make more engaging, more informative meetings like that's where most of my time is spent as a consultant?
[00:28:59.290] - Speaker 1
How do I make this meaningful to your employees? But it's not a waste of their time and your time, because if people go, oh, God, not another toolbox meeting. It's 15 minutes. I'm never going to get back. Then it's 15 minutes. They're never going to get back. And you should not do it.
[00:29:14.360] - Speaker 2
Two reflections. The first is I like, whenever you are an employee who's frustrated, they're always going to throw up. And that's my favorite thing. You lean forward and you're like, oh, my God. That's the first one. And the second thing is because I got asked this a lot. You and I clearly live in this world where we talk about leading legging indicators. So if you're not familiar with those terms, the simplest explanation I ever heard is a legging indicator would be like, around weight loss. A legging indicator would be pounds lost.
[00:29:42.530] - Speaker 2
The lead indicators would be how many calories you've eaten and how many hours you worked out. So if you can take that formula and look at your business, be like, okay, if our leg indicator is closed deals, maybe your lead indicators could be phone calls made and new client introductions. Anyhow. Nonetheless. Last question, because I'm going to ask this earlier, but I'm like, you know what? I didn't want to wrap up with this one, because if you Google Tyler Foley or you go on LinkedIn and put Tyler Foley, F-O-L-E-Y.
[00:30:10.220] - Speaker 2
You'll see, Tyler has done a lot of media. There's a lot of great stories out there about him. But one thing that I think that you bring uniquely that really others can't is you do have this strong story about how you use tragedy to do good. If somebody this is resonating with them right now, they're like, yeah, my mom's passing or my grandparents or my sister, my sibling or my spouse. And I need to do something about this. What are some things you would recommend they do?
[00:30:40.940] - Speaker 2
And I'm not suggesting maybe it's a workshop. Maybe it's some reflection. I don't know. What is there an answer for that?
[00:30:47.370] - Speaker 1
Yeah, I think I know where you're going with that. We kind of alluded to it at the beginning of the episode. And so it would be a nice way to end cap it. And that is the thing you're afraid to say is probably the thing that people need to hear, especially as a leader. And if there is some motivating factor that's driving you and it doesn't always have to be tragedy. And I think that's the mistake that most people make, Mathieu, is they think they need to have this epic event or that the story that they tell needs to be an Arnold Schwarzenegger blockbuster action film, and it doesn't.
[00:31:29.130] - Speaker 1
If anybody wants to listen back, it was probably the two or three minute Mark of this show. We talked about my dad's passing. It is not an epic tale. It's not something that's going to make a Hollywood script. It was an event that happened. But I know why it's important. And when I tell the story of why it's important, I know what details matter. The details that matter is my dad was a hard worker. He was just trying to put food on the table for his family.
[00:31:59.790] - Speaker 1
And because he was not thinking safety and was just thinking production, he ended up costing his family more than he gave them. And it's telling that story from that point of view, knowing why I'm telling that story, Les Brown says it famously, you never make a point without a story, never tell a story without a point. You need to know why this thing is important to you and why you need to share it. Because if you don't share some of that stuff, there is no connection to the motivating factors of why you're doing these things.
[00:32:39.210] - Speaker 1
And a lot of times you see these business owners, well, it doesn't matter. People don't need to know I am the leader. I lead this ship. I tell you which way to go, and that's how it is. You don't question my orders, we do it. And that is one leadership style. And then the buck stops with you. And if you're comfortable with that, but you'd be surprised what happens when you say my reason for doing this is I'm not asking people to question your authority. What I'm asking is for you to step up in front of it and tell them this is why I feel this way, because what that does is it allows for communication.
[00:33:17.490] - Speaker 1
It allows for people to, first of all, understand what your rationale is. And I saw another great quote, and I don't know who said it, but the difference between a leader and a bully is how they respond to criticism, right? A leader will take it and process it and go, okay. I accept that as a viewpoint. Is it my viewpoint and how does it work into what I have? Because knowledge is potential power. And if you shut out other opinions, you don't have all the knowledge necessary.
[00:33:47.770] - Speaker 1
And subsequently, if you want to be a really good leader and then have a good safety culture, you invite some of this input. I'm not saying that you have to accept every bit of advice because you are the leader. Part of the hardship of being in leadership is that you have to be the one to make the tough calls. And sometimes there is no clear path forward. And you just have to pull out that machete and start hacking at the jungle and say, I've got a heading on this Compass and we're going this way until we can't go this way no more.
[00:34:18.640] - Speaker 1
But at least say it's because I know that there's a river course. If we go west, then people will follow you blindly on a Western direction until you find the river course. And it may never be there, but they're like, we will get there until we get to the water because you've given them the rationale. If you just say, I'm just going to hack at these weeds and hope we get somewhere, nobody's going to follow you.
[00:34:41.070] - Speaker 2
Well, I'll say this. Tyler Foley, master safety consultant, master of teaching freedom, holding his breath, saving employees from death. As smart as he can be. He is the master. He'll save you from disaster and make your employees day. Thank you so much for coming on the show today. I really appreciate the time you gave us before we go. A bunch of people helped put the show together. It's not just me. I don't get to come on a podcast and like, wax poetic about safety with you. Cindy Craig does all our booking.
[00:35:13.420] - Speaker 2
Naomi Grossman helps get prepared for the questions we do research together on this. Jesus brains behind the stuff we talk about. Jamie Hunter, if you saw this on social, you can thank him. He's our content manager. Does all that work. Geoff Anhorn edited the video. If you're watching video of this on social, Austin Pomeroy is the audio tech who made it sound so great. Kerry Cotton, she is the one that does not appear on this balance sheet because she's doing all the hard work, taking care of our accounts, running the business while I'm here talking to you.
[00:35:42.560] - Speaker 2
And of course, my wife, Alison. We've been working at home for a while together, and she makes everything that has to be quiet so we can record a podcast. So, Tyler, again, thank you so much. Where can people find out about your business and more about you?
[00:35:57.710] - Speaker 1
Well, Mathieu, the best thing that they can do is to go to my website and I'll tell them how to get to my website. First of all, if they check the show notes or any of the links of anything that you posted, they're going to be there. But that means that they're going to your web page and that they are actively listening to this. So to your audience. If you are getting value out of what Mathieu's team is putting together and just think of all the people that he just acknowledged.
[00:36:22.790] - Speaker 1
It is a massive effort to bring content to you every day. So if you are getting value out of leading with nice, I would encourage you to give a little value back. And that is to leave a five star review on whatever platform you're listening to this. Now, it doesn't take any time you hit pause right now. I'll be back in 2 seconds. If you just hit pause right now, you go give a five star review or a thumbs up like the Bell subscribe. Do whatever it is that you need to do to support the show so that you can continue to get good content through it.
[00:36:50.860] - Speaker 1
And if you can do that and when you're done, look in the show notes, you'll find all the links to my website. You can either go to Totalbuyin. Com. And if you're looking specifically for safety stuff, or if you just think, hey, this Tyler guy's got some interesting things to say, and you want to see more about me on my personal side, you can go to seantylerfoley.com. Sean is spelled the proper Irish way. S-E-A-N-T-Y-L-E-R-F-O-L-E-Y. You go to Shaun Tyler Foley. You can link over the Total Buy-In there.
[00:37:20.420] - Speaker 1
I have everything there, and you have all my socials and everybody can track me down there.
[00:37:24.110] - Speaker 2
Great, great. Well, thank you so much. We Yuill talk to you again. And for listeners, we'll see you next time. Bye.